October 10, 2008

Waters Sweep the Region

Winter still has a sting or two in its tail, warns the operations manager at Horizons Regional Council, Alan Cook.

Strong winds and heavy rains earlier this week have left the region battered and in many areas extremely water-logged.

With more rain forecast, a close watch is being kept on known trouble spots in the region.

Yesterday morning, fields surrounding a section of highway near Opiki had become a lake so deep that only the top few centimetres of fence posts lining the highway broke the surface.

A few kilometres away in Hewitts Road near Linton, the swollen Kahuterawa Stream scoured away a bank, sweeping a tree, a small power pylon and almost half the road way into the water on Sunday.

The pylon and tree were still in the stream yesterday.

Mr Cook said water from the Makino Stream in Feilding had spilled over a low-level stopbank, flooding Kitchener Park and forcing the evacuation of a nearby house. The floodwaters did not enter the house. A slip that blocked the Pahiatua Track below the summit on the Palmerston North side on Tuesday was cleared away soon after, although a digger and work crew were still there yesterday.

Palmerston North City Council received numerous calls about flash flooding in the streets, but these too cleared quickly.

While some of the floods were because of blocked drains, others were caused by the volume of water, said a council worker.